Page 16 of Mud & Moxie
“The storm?” I ask, though we both know she means more than weather.
She nods. “Feels like it’s been building for days.”
“It’ll pass,” I say, then correct myself because I’m done lying to either of us. “It’ll hit. Then it’ll pass.”
She smiles without looking at me, like she heard what I didn’t add: we’ll handle it.
A mile slips under us. The scent of rain threads through the open crack in her window—wet iron and something sweet from the clover fields. I catch myself noticing the small things the way Ray taught me: the way she hums when she’s thinking, the way she tucks her hair when she’s trying not to argue, the way shedoesn’t flinch from hard work even when everyone expects her to.
“You did good today,” I say finally.
“At smiling while the town assigned us a wedding date?” she says lightly, but there’s a fragile seam under the joke.
“At standing your ground,” I answer. “At letting them talk and not letting them take anything.”
She turns then, really looks at me, and I have to glance back at the road before I do something stupid like pull over and ask for what I almost took behind the truck.
“Thank you,” she says. It lands soft but heavy, like a seed you know will turn into trouble if you give it water.
The lane to the farmhouse appears, rutted from last week’s rain. The clouds have stacked higher, bellies green-gray, the kind that lean down and listen. I downshift. The tires bump over the washboard and the daisies wobble against her knees. My chest loosens at the sight of home and cinches at the thought of Matthew reading us from a mile away.
“Whatever happens with the gossip,” I add, surprising myself again, “we handle it together.”
She doesn’t answer right away. Then she nods. “Together.”
It’s a small word. It changes everything.
By the time the farmhouse roof comes into view, storm clouds are stacking on the horizon. The kind that promise more trouble. Madison tucks the daisies into a jar by the window like they belong there. I watch her hands, steady and sure, and wonder how much longer I can pretend this is just strategy.
The sky darkens, and with it the line between fake and real blurs further.
I tell myself to focus on the farm, on debts and repairs.
But when she glances back at me with that soft, unguarded smile, I know the storm ahead isn’t just in the weather.
***
8
Mud Lessons, Messy Heart
MADISON
Ican still feel the shape of his hand on my waist.
Which is ridiculous, because that hand was purely functional—stabilizing, steadying, the kind of hand a grumpy farmer puts on the hip of a city girl who nearly tips a display of beets onto a baby stroller. The kind of hand that means nothing.
Town meant something.
Everyone at the Saturday market saw Dylan tip his hat and slide closer so the woman from the bakery wouldn’t elbow me out of frame. They saw me loop my arm through his like it was the most natural thing in the world. They saw Matthew roll his eyes so hard it should’ve come with its own weather advisory. By the time we turned up the gravel lane, the sun was low and the rumor mill was high.
“Home, sweet circus,” I say under my breath as the farmhouse comes into view, all white siding and stubborn dignity.
Dylan doesn’t answer. He’s quiet, like he’s always quiet, and somehow even more so. He kills the engine. The truck shuddersinto silence. We sit there, not looking at each other, listening to cicadas saw the air in half.
Matthew is already on the porch, arms folded. He has that big-brother posture that says he’s about to be annoying out of love. “You two want a press conference or a plan?”
“Plan,” I say, too fast. “Please. Plan.”
